The Truth About the National Debt: Five Myths and One Reality

by Francis X. Cavanaugh

Challenges conventional wisdom regarding the state of the federal deficit, and includes modest reform proposals

Genres: Economics

172 pages, Hardcover

First published September 1, 1996

Reviews

[The Angry Lawn Gnome · Rating 3 out of 5]

Since this work was published in 1996, the relevance of this work to the horrible reality we presently dwell in is tangential at best. In particular is the amount of US debt foreign governments held then vs. what they hold today. Cavanaugh -- probably correctly -- pooh-poohed the issue at that time given the relatively small amount in question. In 2012? He would be dead wrong to conclude the same thing, though the numbers are such that there's no practical way he could do this.

There are some interesting ideas in here, in particular relating to the way the interest paid on the national debt is reported, the games played across several administrations re: long-term vs. short-term financing, and the idea that "planned deficits" are a very, very bad idea...But, overall unless a reader is interested in what is now essentially a historical perspective on this matter, I think it is one that could be passed by with no particular harm.